NY May 21 Thursday last shows

 We had 3 days this week with temps in the 90s!  Today it's in the 60s and raining!  Fortunately we had clothes for both temps.

Well, it has been a fantastic week! We are down to the last day and the final two shows: "the annual Putnam County spelling bee" and "every brilliant thing".

Spelling bee is a revival, although I had never seen it before..  this audience was really young-- like school age. A lot of groups of kids probably from schools .  Not the blue haired crowd we saw at Wed matinee.  😆

Before the Show they choose four audience members to be contestants. They chose Dianne !!!! So just after the first song, they called the audience contestants up to the stage. When she was called upon to spell,  she had trouble hearing because she had set her hearing aids for an audience member and it was set to get the sound best facing forward.  But the person who gave the word  was off to her side and she didn't hear the word correctly. The word was ptomaine.  She actually knows how to spell it, but that wasn't what she heard so she misspelled it. She was fine with that though, because she could then go sit in the audience and watch the show. A couple of the contestants stayed on for quite awhile.  

The show had two well-known performers:Jon Cryer Who most people know from Two and a Half Men and Kevin McHale who had been on Glee.  It was a very cute show and well executed.

And we looked forward to our final evening show with 1 actor: Daniel Radcliffe ( Harry Potter).  There was a great deal of audience participation, but unfortunately, we were not asked to participate. We had purchased tickets to sit on the stage, which was very cool except that he faced out to the audience more than I would've expected, and when his back was to us, it wasn't always easy to understand him. I actually think they did a rather poor job of mic-ing him.

But it was the most interesting theatrical experience Daniel did an amazing job. 

Thus ends our marathon of 11 shows!  Fantastic !  

Tomorrow, I will try to write a summary, indicating my favorites and recommendations to see or to skip.

I have an early flight so I need to go to bed. 😄💤

NY Wed. May 20, 2026

 We had breakfast at Juniors across the street.  It was amusing that three other people besides Dianne Celebrated birthdays at Junior's for breakfast. 

Wednesday is a 2 show  day.  Matinee was " Chess".  I was familiar with some of the music & the basic storyline but  had never seen it before. This is a revival, which by all reports has been greatly improved from the original. Cast included Lea Michele, Aaron Tveit& Nicholas Christopher ( fab voice). All 3 have outstanding resumes in theatre & their performances were strong. As we have noticed in other shows, lyrics are often very difficult to understand. which detracts from the experience. I don't think it's just old age and our hearing. . I think it's the style of delivery (and so much belting.) but the story was intriguing, especially because some of it was factual.

 I've noticed something in the musicals we have seen this time. They often have the ensemble on stage in the background, just sitting or standing while other action is taking place. Also the choreography has included a lot of the ensemble doing arms in unison (when they weren't dancing in a traditional way).  

We've seen some spectacular sets. Lots of neon being used this time. Certainly some wonderful use of  a video wall. But also some rather traditional looking sets. 

We had dinner at Sardi's.  It was quite full at an early dinner pre-theatre.  And shortly after we were seated, Richard Kind came and sat at the table next to us.  (I was able to sneak a picture. ) 

The evening show was " Proof" starting Ayo Edebiri ( who is in " the Bear" ) &  Don Cheadle ( both of whom are making a Broadway debut).  She was outstanding!  He was very good as well, but he had a much smaller supporting role.

Oddly, this show was overlooked by the Tony nominations. I don't know why.  

We said farewell to Jackie who is flying home in the morning after seeing 15 shows!  She had arrived here a couple days before us. So Dianne and I have our last two shows tomorrow.  😢

NY Tues May 19

 We started today in a very lazy way. Most relaxing. 

Jackie and I treated  Dianne to an early dinner at Chez Josephine because  tomorrow's her birthday.  Restaurant was opened by a son of Josephine Baker so it felt like we were in France.  And the background music included Edith Piaf.  Love it  

Our show tonight was the musical "operation mincemeat" A British show about an actual WWII operation by the Brits to fool Germany by leading them to think they would invade Sardinia when really Sicily was their goal. The show was ( like Titannique) very broad, often slapstick/ cheap tricks  humor that didn't grab any of the 3 of us. It also conveyed a British sense of humor, some of which was lost on us.Not a bad production --there were some good moments.  Tonight's cast included three out of the five member cast who were understudies. They actually did an excellent job performing. It's really the script that did not grab us. The plot  / premise is terrific, but the execution of the production wasn't my kind of humor. Additionally, each character switched into several different characters minute by minute, and you never knew exactly who they were at  any given time. Again, I was not the target audience. Neither were my two friends. 

After I wrote this, Dianne and I read the review of the show in the New York Times. Interestingly, the reviewer had many of the same criticisms that we had. We decided we should be reviewers😆

So at the top of my list for musicals is Schmigadoon by far.  I would see that again in a heartbeat. 

NY May 18 Monday

 No shows today so I met Greg for lunch. Went to the BEST  restaurant: " Robert" which is in the Museum of arts and design on Columbus Circle.  Everything in this small restaurant was a work of art. Art in the room design & on the walls.  Every bite was absolutely artfully delicious. Truly ranks in the top of the list of best food. I will absolutely try to get back there every time I'm in town. We then walked over to the NY library for the performing arts.  I got a library card and because I'm directing a production of Charlie Brown I now have access to watch a recording of the Broadway show. I will, however, have to have enough time to sit down and do that. I don't think I'll have time this trip. But maybe I need to come back in a couple months?...😉

For dinner Jackie reserved a place called the green room 42  ( " at this performance ") --a cabaret type show--where the entertainers are  B'way & off B'way performers (understudies, stand-bys etc) who sang a couple songs each.  They were excellent. Many of them understudy leading roles and have been able to go on for those roles.  Really good entertainment. And dinner was tasty too. So it's a good thing to do on an evening when there's no theater.

We're getting a lot of walking in. Tomorrow is supposed to be over 90° so I'm not sure that we'll want to walk much.   Crazy temperature, considering it's May in New York. 

PS    I am bummed out that I can't access my photos. Google does weird stuff and changes things and I haven't kept up. So I have pictures to post, but it's not letting me.😢

NY May 17 Sunday

 Another double header day. 

First up was "Giant" with John Lithgow. This told a story about author Roald Dahl and the controversy about an antisemitic statement he made publicly.  Also in the cast were Aya Cash & several British actors. The show originally  played in London, with pretty much the same cast  where it received tremendous acclaim. They then brought it to New York for its first showing here.   The acting was absolutely stellar.  The story was provocative.  We all loved it. Several of the cast members and the show itself has many Tony nominations.

In the evening was the satire of the movie Titanic-- "Titanique"which used the music of Celine Dion-- basically, a jukebox musical. As I know none of her music, I did not recognize most of the music ( and I am not a fan of her).   The audience was ecstatic, and their screaming and yelling and applauding constantly was pretty irritating to me. Clearly I was not at all the target audience for this show.  The pop culture references were lost on me. The show seemed cobbled together.   I will say that the leading lady ( Marla Mindell )  who satirized Céline Dion did an excellent job. Several of the voices were excellent. The cast also included Melissa Barrera who was in the film of  "In the Heights". The set was very interesting. And for me, the most interesting thing was that Jim Parsons played Rose's mother. But overall I'm not a fan of this show. I felt similarly about the musical we saw last fall--" Queen of Versailles" and it had a short run. This one I think will make more money by far because of the appeal to a target audience. I know I'm a snob when I say that the very broad humor appealed to a less urbane audience.   

NY May 16 Saturday

 Mornings are lazy in NY since we're up so late at night. We can ease into the day. Nice. 

The 3 of us will see most shows together but a few times we go separate ways. Matinee today I went alone to see the new "Rocky Horror Show",  directed by Sam Pinkerton who directed Oh Mary previously.  Knew it would be insane & it was.  It   was theatre from the moment I entered the door.  Dark, loud music, lights strung from every place possible, & theatre-goers with fun attire-- of course fishnet stockings & gloves, some outlandish outfits and interesting makeup.  Everyone was there for the same reason: to have fun! I just had such a grin on my face for the longest time. Cast was strong including Luke Evans, Andrew Durand & Rachel Dratch as narrator ( you know from SNL). ( tho' I wasn't in thrilled with Janet) .  Audience behaved pretty well and only participated appropriately e.g."Brad asshole. Janet slut." 🤣 fun times! 

I met up with the others for dinner then the 3 of us went to "Death of a Salesman"  with Laurie Metcalf , Nathan Lane & Christopher Abbott-- all of whom have Tony noms for their roles. So intense, so powerful..  imaginative & fascinating staging ;and  this play has held up so well. Lots of Tony possibilities here. I can't imagine seeing better dramatic  performances.( The review in The New York Times is a really interesting read).  

( I'm very tired so excuse my quick scribbles) 

NY May 15, 2025

 I arrived yesterday but just now I'm getting caught up on the blog. I made a very last-minute decision to take a very early flight yesterday morning so that I could see a show last night and I made it with about five minutes to spare.🤪 I took a 5 AM flight so I stayed at a hotel by the airport the night before but got very little sleep. I arrived at LaGuardia around 5 o'clock. Got to the hotel about 615 and was able to dump my bags and leave in time to get to the 7:00 show. But it was worth all of it!

 I met up with Jackie and we saw Schmigadoon which has swept the Tony nominations. It was over the top fantastic! I'm so happy I made the effort. There were so many references to every Broadway musical I've ever seen or done.  Some references were just a phrase of music. Sometimes it was a line Or a character being like one we knew in musicals. For example, there was a character like Billy Bigelow, in carousel. Sometimes a song would start with the same phrase of a familiar show tune like something from the music man and then the song became totally different and it was a different song, but it tricked you into thinking it was going to be a song you knew.  

I assume not everyone in the audience got all the same innuendos but certainly a sophisticated Broadway audience who loved musicals would have gotten the references. Absolutely Hysterical!  The audience was through the roof in their enthusiasm. In the cast was Ana Gasteyer ( SNL) . 

Last night I managed to sleep nearly 10 hours! So I felt quite normal today. Jackie went off to see a museum and Dianne  and I did a little shopping around Times Square. We met up with Jackie in time for dinner. The restaurant we thought we would go to ended up being closed and we didn't have time to search around so we went to Olive Garden. Actually, they had a small portion of eggplant Parmesan so I was a happy camper. Tonight Dianne and I went to a play that was a revival with new Tony nominations. It's called Becky Shaw. It was a dark comedy. The writing was hysterical. There were so many laugh out loud lines. But every character in the show was dysfunctional and they all pointed fingers at everybody else being dysfunctional, but usually did not recognize it in themselves. It was quite amusing, and I was shocked when it was intermission because it just seemed like 15 minutes to me. Same thing with the conclusion-- It was over too fast. The cast included Andrew Ball ( the Pitt) who was excellent.  

Tomorrow will be the first doubleheader.  We're off to a wonderful start!

😎